November, 2012

It is no wonder Dana White called Georges St. Pierre the “King of Pay Per View” (PPV) on a conference call tuesday. UFC 154, which featured the return of the welterweight champion, succesfully defending his title against interim champ Carlos Condit, did anywhere between 680,000 to 700,000 buys, according to Dave Meltzer.

Both UFC 148 and 145 were centered on intense and well-publicized rivalries. UFC 154′s success can likely be attributed more singularly to the personal popularity of the returning Georges St. Pierre. As Meltzer explains:

In the filmmaking/advertising business, the most common phrase you will hear is “Hey kid, if you want to make it anywhere you WILL get in this van.” But the second most common thing you will hear is to “show, not tell” — which oddly enough, normally precedes the first saying. So it is perhaps a testament to the people working in the Brazilian sector of Honda’s marketing department that they were able to convey so much in their new 45 second ad despite the fact that I couldn’t understand a goddamned word that was being said.

Seriously, this video has everything. Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira rubbing lotion on his gloves. NO I DON’T KNOW WHY. Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira eating a pineapple and dancing Gangnam style, then getting a spray tan. AGAIN, NO IDEA. Yet at the end of the day, the message is clear: HONDA GOOD. HONDA GET WOMAN. And being that it’s Brazilian, the ad also makes sure to squeeze in a few seconds of said women engaging in a pose-off whilst flames shoot out of some giant mechanical ring in the background. Did I not mention that this video has everything?

After the jump: A completely unrelated video that proves the superiority of Brazilian television once and for all. Again, it’s probably better if you just go in blind for this one.

One of the oldest combat sports training myths is that abstaining from sex helps your performance on fight night. Phil Baroni may have put it best when he told us: “You take punches better when you abstain from, ah…punching your own loads out. It makes you fuckin’ mean, I’ll tell you that much.”

“For girls it raises your testosterone, so I try to have as much sex as possible before I fight actually. Not with like everybody, I don’t put out like a Craigslist ad or anything, but if I got a steady I’m going to be like ‘yo, fight time’s coming up’,” Rousey said with a laugh.

However: “You can’t (expletive) somebody and go fight that day.”

Sex with Ronda Rousey has to be a terrifying experience. Think about it. There you are, just sitting on the couch catching up on the Sunday Styles section, when Ronda busts in wearing a damp rash-guard, and says “Yo, fight time’s coming up. Dick: out,” then angrily demands that you get in her guard while at least one Diaz brother lurks around in the kitchen, trying to figure out how to use the blender. Are you man enough to deal with that?

We were already plenty excited for former lightweight champion Frankie Edgar‘s challenge of featherweight king Jose Aldo — which will finally take place February 2nd at UFC 156 — but it turns out the stakes are larger than we thought. Aldo says that if he beats Edgar he will know he’s ready to move up to 155 pounds and challenge for that belt.

Edgar is trying to see if his speed will translate at featherweight and bring him more gold. Aldo is similarly using the fight as a litmus test for his readiness to take on the lightweights of the world. MMA Fighting’s Dave Doyle has the report.

“I’ve considered going to lightweight,” said Aldo. “As soon as my trainer decides that I can go up, then I will. This fight with Edgar will be a turning point. If I can win [against] him well, then I can prove that I can go [to 155 pounds].”

Everybody gather around and break out your tinfoil hats, because it’s conspiracy time.

The above clip comes to us courtesy of Inside MMA, who recently held interviews with both the lightweight number one contender Nate Diaz and coach Cesar Gracie, who is beginning to sound like little more than an omnipresent entity whose soul (get it? SOUL? I should really be getting paid more for this gold) reason for existence is to echo whatever a Diaz brother manages to mumble out between bong rips.

From what we could decipher, it appears that both Nate and Cesar have finally caught on to the longest running screwjob in MMA history: The judges vs. The brothers Diaz. Gracie was able to see through the bullshit and was the first to bring this to light, stating:

I’ve never really seen a close decision where the nod was given to the Diaz’s. If it’s close, they’re going to lose. I don’t know why, maybe the judges don’t really care for them that much; they’re brash.

While we were initially content to play Team Cesar Gracie a song on the world’s smallest violin, upon doing a little research (I KNOW RIGHT), we actually stumbled across a plot so thick and intricate that not even Nicolas Cage could unravel it in a series of increasingly shitty kids movies, so join us after the jump if you think your puny Earthling brains can handle it.

(The “doctor” in question. No joke, this is seriously the guy we’re talking about. / Props: Blog do Olivar)

In the U.S., a doctor is simply the person you visit when you need more prescription medication. In Brazil, a doctor is a parent, priest, and boss rolled into one — they know what’s best for you, and damned if you’ll try to defy them.

“It would be a crime for Anderson to try and fight at 77kg. He could maybe make the weight but the physical loss that he would suffer would be too much…For me this fight should happen at 80kg, since that would already be a sacrifice for Anderson. It would be his first shot at this weight and we would have to implement a very specific work for him to be able to perform at 100% of his capacity…Anderson losing 3gk and St-Pierre going up 3kg would be more fair for both of them and for the public, who would watch a great fight.”

Here in the Potato Nation we don’t take time to discuss boxing all too often. But we’d be remiss if we didn’t bring you HBO’s behind-the-scenes look at the next chapter of a rivalry that is already one of boxing’s greatest of all time.

On December 8th, Manny Pacquiao and Juan Manuel Marquez will fight one another for the fourth time in eight years. And no, this isn’t one of those boxing promoter scams where the same decrepit guys get rolled out in wheelchairs to fight one another, over and again, long after interest has died in the match up. Pacquiao and Marquez fill two of the top three pound-for-pound spots in boxing, in this writer’s opinion, and their first three fights have left fans clamoring for a fourth.

As episode 1 of this 24/7 documentary mini-series shows with footage and round-by-round analysis from the fighters, coaches and even a judge, all three fights were extremely close and could have gone one of three ways — a win for either man or a draw, as the first one did in May 2004. Since then, Pacquiao has gotten the nods, with a split-decision in 2008 and a majority decision last year.

Before Nate Diaz decided to put the Funyuns aside and start making a serious run at the 155 lb title, he floated between the welterweight and lightweight divisions for the majority of his UFC career with mixed results. However, his greatest performance at 170 came at UFC 118, where Diaz faced off against Irish-American powerhouse Marcus Davis. Known for his Angel of Death right hand, Davis was fresh off a TKO victory over the UFC’s favorite narcoleptic French Canadian, Jonathan Goulet, at UFC 114, and planned to do the same with Nate. But as Rory Markham and Melvin Guillard should have informed him, one-punch knockout power stands no chance against the iron chin and hailstorm of pitter-patter punches that constitute a Diaz beating.

The fight was classic Diaz — taunting within the first 30 seconds of the fight, getting rocked yet continuing to taunt upon recovery, breaking their opponents will until they finally give up — and received Fight of the Night honors when all was said and done. While we can assume that Nate blew the extra cash on beluga caviar and front row tickets to A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Davis undoubtedly spent his hiring Thedus’ finest doctor to remove the baby alien that Diaz had somehow implanted in his right eyeball.

Since 2004, the UFC’s Super Bowl weekend card in Las Vegas has been one of the most stacked pay-per-view events on the promotion’s annual schedule — and 2013′s will be no different. But in a conference call held yesterday for UFC on FOX 5: Henderson vs. Diaz, Fox Sports Group president Eric Shanks voiced his desire to make 2014′s installment a massive free event on FOX, as the network will also be broadcasting Super Bowl XLVIII, which goes down February 2nd, 2014, at MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford, NJ. As Shanks said:

“We think that Super Bowl week in New York is going to be like anything else. We’re gonna own the city, we’re going to own that week of sports television and there’s nothing better we can think of than a big fight that week. So, we’re talking to Dana and Lorenzo about that. We’d love for that to happen. We’ll see if they can put that together.”

Hosting a UFC event in New York City still seems like a lost cause, but maybe the neighboring Izod Center in East Rutherford (max. capacity: 20,000) would be a logical next-best option. And if FOX really wants to make Super Bowl weekend a monster for their network — thereby sticking it up ESPN’s ass — Shanks and his crew would do all they can to make sure that the Super Bowl Eve 2014 UFC card is stacked to the damn rafters. So let’s all put on our fantasy-caps and come up with the craziest five-fight main card that the UFC could put on that night. Here’s how I see it…

Anderson Silva vs. Jon Jones [main event, 195-pound catchweight]
The fantasy fight of all UFC fantasy fights. Anderson will indeed take most of 2013 off before defending his middleweight belt in late fall 2013, maybe against Bisping, maybe against Weidman. (By the way, the Silva vs. GSP fight isn’t going to happen. Sorry about that.) Meanwhile, Jones will smash Chael Sonnen in April, then beat up the winner of Henderson vs. Machida in late summer. At that point, there won’t be anything left for Silva and Jones but each other. Convinced by the promise of a non-title catchweight and a billion dollars, Silva will finally accept the fight against Jones. Anderson Silva will win by TKO in one of the UFC’s all-time greatest battles, then announce his retirement during the post-fight interview with Joe Rogan. The Spider will then bow to the crowd, before beaming back up to his home planet. Rogan will be like, “I FUCKING KNEW IT! AND NONE OF YOU WOULD BELIEVE ME! AHHHHHHH!”

Years ago, my dad saw a young Georges St. Pierre fight before I did. When I finally got a chance to see GSP in action, I agreed with my dad that he was like some Jean Claude Van Damme movie character come to life, what with his crazy kicks and foreign accent.

How awesome and funny would it be if Van Damme and his real fighter counterpart ever met, we laughed. Turns out, it’s just creepy.

Van Damme spent some time in Montreal with St. Pierre before UFC 154 working out, which is captured in this new video that he produced. We give Van Damme credit for being an actual athlete and for staying in amazing shape — and for, more than likely, being able to kick our asses — but he is creeping into Steven Seagal territory with this video.

While no one can approach the arrogance and outright fabrications of Seagal, Van Damme’s video does include a highlight reel mixing him acting in movies and St. Pierre fighting in real life. Ok, for writers of a certain age (mine) who grew up loving Van Damme movies, short-short splits on counter tops and all, the highlight reel is kind of dope.

Then you realize, “wait, is he actually drawing parallels between his movie roles and St. Pierre?” All that we can forgive the fifty-something actor. It is understandable that a Hollywood actor would try to get attention by jumping on to the MMA bandwagon. Van Damme also seems to be a legit fan of the sport and its athletes. It’s just that he may be too much of a fan of its athletes. Remember his creepy attempted make-out session with Fedor a few years ago?